High school teacher Susie Garcia recently became the second female finalist eliminated on So You Think You Can Dance 4. In a conference call with media, Susie answered questions about her teaching status and her students. Susie said, “I am actually still a high school teacher. I’m going to go back now to Miami to all my students over there. And they were just very, very pleased to see me on the show and very proud of me. And they just always would say that they look up to what I’ve done, and they look forward to doing big things as well when they get older.”

During So You Think You Can Dance, the judges often called Susie hot. When asked if her student’s would give her a difficult time about it, Susie said, “Yes. It’s funny because I’ve always been known as that on the show, and I have so much more to offer. I’ve taken modern and ballet and flamenco, and I studied in an art school in the university, so it’s a little downfall. They do call me the hot, the hotness, and the fact that I’m a high school teacher, everybody puts up as it’s a bad thing. But I can’t help what other people see me as, and I’m not just the hotness, or whatever. I take my dance very seriously, and I love the art. And I teach my students to love the art as well and teach them every aspect of dance.”

When asked if she thought her sexy moves or her sexy clothing on So You Think You Can Dance could affect her job back home, Susie said, “I dance with the Heat. And in the Miami Heat, I also had that, being the whole sexy thing and stuff like that, and I was a teacher as well. One thing is another. It’s not – it’s nowhere near as far as the whole hotness and stuff like that. They just see as that’s all I can do. And it’s not that. Yes, I am a young high school teacher. I don’t dress in sparkles and feathers, like how I did in the show, obviously. It’s a performance, and you just have to be in that character when you’re on stage. And you’ve got to do that. And then I’m a teacher as well, just like any of the other contestants that teach in the dance studio. It’s the same thing. I just teach high school.”

Susie also added, “So, I was a little disappointed because probably they would think, ‘Oh, a high school teacher. Oh, my God. Look how she’s dancing.’ It’s okay, guys. I’m not a biochemist teacher. I am a dance teacher.”

When asked if she had gotten any feedback from her students or their parents, Susie said, “Oh, yes. They’re so happy for me. The parents are so happy.” Susie continued, “They made a big scrapbook for me with pictures of them and watch parties and stuff like that. They’ve been so supportive, and they look up to me so much and what I did. And I love that – that they tell me that everyday. And they say, ‘Miss, you’re the greatest thing that’s happened to us. And you’re the reason why I want to dance now. And this is something I never knew that I was going to do, and you opened those doors for me.’ So that, right there just – it makes everything great.”

After her salsa with Marquis Cunningham, the judges told Susie Garcia that the dance didn’t live up to their expectations. In regards to the judges’ comments, Susie said, “You know what’s funny? I was pleased learning it and doing it on the show. And Susie is always known as a fireball and very sassy and just with a lot of energy, so I’m always told to hold back a little bit. And because I have too much energy when I dance, I’m very sharp, and I do a lot of staccato movements and stuff. So I may have taken that and just held it back a little bit, just so the salsa won’t seem so fake, or so out there, as far as faces and stuff like that. And they wanted to see more. So it’s weird. It’s a very weird thing because you just never know what they’re going to say and what they see.”

When asked if she was surprised to be eliminated, Susie replied, “I definitely was surprised, being eliminated. I honestly thought that I was going to stay a little bit longer. I was looking forward to doing the tour as well. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen for me, but this experience has been great, and I’m just going to take it and go back to Miami and see what happens. And I just want to do so much now, and it’s just going to open so many other doors as far as I want to have my own dance studio in Miami and just let it grow, so that Miami could be something like LA and New York, as far as dancing.”